Re: [Vo]:Stabilizing the E-Cat
no need of a total theory to control a complex system. and even with a total theory about a mechanisme, the real system is often very different, much complex and simple that the predicted system. the engineer method is to learn the characteristic of the system, upfront (eg: pulse response) and eventually continually (adaptative control). the interest of the theory is to know the limit of what you have measured (knowing that above a given limit it can diverge, saturate, oscillate, dampen...). if you try to control externally a structurally unstable system like an auto-catalytic reaction, with irreversible saturation (like hot gaz+powder LENR), the slow global control is a bad idea, since the external inertia of the system is too much to allow quick enough feedback. anyway you have various solution, that you should merge as needed. one first method is to find a structural feed back at the local level. ther is some in nuclear reactors, but seems non for LENR (no resonance). the second one is thermal dissipation feedback, that cause heat transfer to increase when temperature difference increase, so having a fluid at the similar temperature of the target, with high conductivity(if teperature difference is too high, cconductivity have to be lower else the cooling is so strong that the reaction is stopped), will stabilise the temperature naturally, up to a point where autocatalysis overcame the heat conductivity. H2 seems to be a good cooling (dPproduced/dTRthermal). H2 seems to be a good conductivity fluid, and powder have a good transfer caracteristic. another solution is to play with the different thermal resistance for different timescale, linked to thermal inertia. at short term the inertia of the powder, or reactor is the dominant factor. at longer term the external control can have an effect. another factor is tha LENR seems to be multi-stage, so ther might be 2 or more simultaneous decay/autocatalysis that happens at different timescale (probably 300ns for LENR eruption, then few seconds minutes for radioactive decay) so if you send pulse to activate the reaction, you can estimate that the reaction is between a grain and a heavy thermal mass at reactor temperature, and mostly activate the initial eruption. when the pulse stop, the heat can be spread in the global reactor and the cooling fluid. the radioactive decay is then the dominant factor, and can be controlled with external slow feedback (like by cooling fluid speed control, via the flux calorimeter of DGT))so the idea of Defkalion to use pulse witdt/frequency control, is coherent with the idea to avoid reaction divergence at short term, and allow slow control of heat/temperature so the next pulse will happen in a stable environment. measuring the heat production, will also allow to measure the efficiency of the previous pulse, and compute the next one to be just enough efficient, avoiding meltdown and shutdown. all that make me convinced they have a good control, even if they have no validated theory, but just a phenomenological model and few theoretical assumptions the Rossi apparatus, manual throttle, cool but uncontrolled fluid, uncontrolled flow, in his older experiment seems not compatible with a good control, except if he have an intrinsic stabilizing factor (that seems false) like fission reactors. It is logic that in those condition, whe COP and temperature are pushed, it melt down. by the way it is a bit amateur. the push buttons stability claimed by rossi last visitor is much more coherent. however the fact that he says that the reactor take 1 hour to start, is a bit strange, but maybe it is only the slow heating up to working point, dow slowly to avoid unstability. maybe DGT have found a quick method to heat the reactor (their secret first phase heating) up to a controlled temperature, that avoid startup, but accelerate heating. good control of a LENr reactor seems to imply an adaptative controller, and internal flow calorimetry (flow control, and temperature sensors) to control the reaction efficiency. all to say that controlling LENR for me seems classic engineer job. much easier than controlling a supersonic fighter at transonic speed. there are wagons of student trained to solve that kind of problems, and I was in the same train as them 20years ago. 2012/4/2 David Roberson dlrober...@aol.com In my opinion it will be far easier to control the variations in performance and parameters which determine these variations once a proven theory of operation exists. Until that time we will be stumbling along at less than ideal performance. Dave -Original Message- From: Axil Axil janap...@gmail.com To: vortex-l vortex-l@eskimo.com Sent: Sun, Apr 1, 2012 7:21 pm Subject: [Vo]:Stabilizing the E-Cat Stabilizing the E-Cat It is a common belief among knowledgeable cold fusion pundits that both Rossi and DGT face challenges in controlling the reactions in their reactors. One important reason
Re: [Vo]:Stabilizing the E-Cat
just to note that Rossi just answered with the kind of control he use... - have you built a mathematical model of your reactor above 260°C? *- which control method are you using for your reactor? (PI/PID/MPC) * - what is the length of the control horizon of an industrial ecat? (seconds/mins/hours) 1- yes 2- *MPC *3- seconds 4- The E-Cats can’t explode because they are intrinsecally safe. Answered by Andrea Rossi he use Model Predicting Control. it is a classic, yet modern method, adapted to complex, and eventually non linear systems. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Model_predictive_control I imagine that the parameters are adaptive, but who knows with Rossi. no information about the kind of action (pulse or not) Logically for defkalion it should be similar. Me I would make a non-linear adaptive MPC, with few loops at different time-scale, using different captors (flow calorimeter, core temp, maybe if useful core optical?, impedance? noise? gamma/neutrons? to catch LENR reaction state itself), and an intrinsic loop (probably thermal as I explain earlier)... but from DGT information it seems quite simple (just core temp and calorimetry). not rocket science 2012/4/2 Alain Sepeda alain.sep...@gmail.com no need of a total theory to control a complex system. and even with a total theory about a mechanisme, the real system is often very different, much complex and simple that the predicted system. ...
Re: [Vo]:Stabilizing the E-Cat
You have presented a pretty good discussion of the methods of control and it will be useful for all of us to give the techniques serious consideration. My concern is not in controlling that which is currently available, but to derive the best possible system to control. There are numerous variables which interact in different ways in such a system and the theoretical understanding of each of these variables and how it performs to make a total device is extremely important. A good understanding of the effect of powder size would be advantageous. The processing of its surface features in the best possible manner might make a huge difference in the overall performance. Could a thin coating over a portion of the surface area by an active material that dissociates hydrogen molecules be important to the reaction? What about the ratio of other materials in the final mix of core powder? Does the magnitude and direction of an external magnetic field enhance or reduce the reaction as some have suggested? I wonder if a DC current flowing through the powder from end to end or from center to outside edge would help? Could another gas mixed with the hydrogen modify the reaction in a desired direction? My point is that there are many unknowns at this time and I suspect that they interact in unusual ways. A good theory of the actual process taking place could help immensely in determining the idea device design and until that is achieved we might be close enough for a useful product, but a long way from the ideal design. Serendipity plays a major role in scientific progress, but the ideal situation is for that to be enhanced by the follow on theory. At the present time I am following the work of Rossi and DGT who seem to be approaching the reaction from two different directions. Is it possible that there are two vary different processes taking place or are they each enhancing the variables in a separate manner? Dave -Original Message- From: Alain Sepeda alain.sep...@gmail.com To: vortex-l vortex-l@eskimo.com Sent: Mon, Apr 2, 2012 4:14 am Subject: Re: [Vo]:Stabilizing the E-Cat no need of a total theory to control a complex system. and even with a total theory about a mechanisme, the real system is often very different, much complex and simple that the predicted system. the engineer method is to learn the characteristic of the system, upfront (eg: pulse response) and eventually continually (adaptative control). the interest of the theory is to know the limit of what you have measured (knowing that above a given limit it can diverge, saturate, oscillate, dampen...). if you try to control externally a structurally unstable system like an auto-catalytic reaction, with irreversible saturation (like hot gaz+powder LENR), the slow global control is a bad idea, since the external inertia of the system is too much to allow quick enough feedback. anyway you have various solution, that you should merge as needed. one first method is to find a structural feed back at the local level. ther is some in nuclear reactors, but seems non for LENR (no resonance). the second one is thermal dissipation feedback, that cause heat transfer to increase when temperature difference increase, so having a fluid at the similar temperature of the target, with high conductivity(if teperature difference is too high, cconductivity have to be lower else the cooling is so strong that the reaction is stopped), will stabilise the temperature naturally, up to a point where autocatalysis overcame the heat conductivity. H2 seems to be a good cooling (dPproduced/dTRthermal). H2 seems to be a good conductivity fluid, and powder have a good transfer caracteristic. another solution is to play with the different thermal resistance for different timescale, linked to thermal inertia. at short term the inertia of the powder, or reactor is the dominant factor. at longer term the external control can have an effect. another factor is tha LENR seems to be multi-stage, so ther might be 2 or more simultaneous decay/autocatalysis that happens at different timescale (probably 300ns for LENR eruption, then few seconds minutes for radioactive decay) so if you send pulse to activate the reaction, you can estimate that the reaction is between a grain and a heavy thermal mass at reactor temperature, and mostly activate the initial eruption. when the pulse stop, the heat can be spread in the global reactor and the cooling fluid. the radioactive decay is then the dominant factor, and can be controlled with external slow feedback (like by cooling fluid speed control, via the flux calorimeter of DGT))so the idea of Defkalion to use pulse witdt/frequency control, is coherent with the idea to avoid reaction divergence at short term, and allow slow control of heat/temperature so the next pulse will happen in a stable environment. measuring the heat production, will also allow to measure the efficiency
Re: [Vo]:Stabilizing the E-Cat
Axil, Deposit Ni by vacuum evaporation from a suspension of same in light hydrocarbon. See: http://www.mail-archive.com/vortex-l%40eskimo.com/msg64616.html Coat the Cu in the plate exchanger. Warm Regards, Reliable Axil Axil wrote: Stabilizing the E-Cat It is a common belief among knowledgeable cold fusion pundits that both Rossi and DGT face challenges in controlling the reactions in their reactors. One important reason for this is process variation. Naturally occurring variations in the physical properties of the materials that are responsive to the reaction may vary widely. These physical variations will produce corresponding variability in the reaction produced by the various ranges in material composition. This range of variation in the material will reduce both the performance and controllability of the material based on how widely the variation deviates from the optimum specification regardless whether this variance falls below or rises above that specification. Specifically for E-Cat micro powder, isotopic content, particle size and shape, inter-particle contact points between each particle or sets of particles, hydrogen flow patterns around particles, and hydrogen based particle heat transfer dynamics may all be important material variation parameters. Prefabrication, characterization and testing of subunits are all important enablers of quality control and optimization through standardization. The experience in process control gleaned from the semiconductor industry teach how designers using process control modalities run tens to thousands of simulations to analyze how the outputs of a circuit will behave according to the measured variability of the transistors for that standardization process. The measured criteria for transistors are recorded in model files given to designers for simulating their circuits before simulation. In this semiconductor example, if the variance causes the measured or simulated performance of a particular output metric (bandwidth, gain, rise time, etc.) to fall below or rise above the specification for the particular circuit or device it reduces the overall yield for that set of devices. One possible design approach is to stabilize the micro-powder onto a substrate to make the material more like a transistor. Weld the micro-powder onto a nickel nanowire of thin film to stabilize each particle’s mechanical contact environment. This enables each wire to be tested reliably against a specification. Then sets of wires typified by a common performance profile can be grouped and configured in a thermal circuit driven by precise computer control. In common service: Axil
Re: [Vo]:Stabilizing the E-Cat
In my opinion it will be far easier to control the variations in performance and parameters which determine these variations once a proven theory of operation exists. Until that time we will be stumbling along at less than ideal performance. Dave -Original Message- From: Axil Axil janap...@gmail.com To: vortex-l vortex-l@eskimo.com Sent: Sun, Apr 1, 2012 7:21 pm Subject: [Vo]:Stabilizing the E-Cat Stabilizing the E-Cat It is a common belief among knowledgeable cold fusion pundits that both Rossi and DGT face challenges in controlling the reactions in their reactors. One important reason for this is process variation. Naturally occurring variations in the physical properties of the materials that are responsive to the reaction may vary widely. These physical variations will produce corresponding variability in the reaction produced by the various ranges in material composition. This range of variation in the material will reduce both the performance and controllability of the material based on how widely the variation deviates from the optimum specification regardless whether this variance falls below or rises above that specification. Specifically for E-Cat micro powder, isotopic content, particle size and shape, inter-particle contact points between each particle or sets of particles, hydrogen flow patterns around particles, and hydrogen based particle heat transfer dynamics may all be important material variation parameters. Prefabrication, characterization and testing of subunits are all important enablers of quality control and optimization through standardization. The experience in process control gleaned from the semiconductor industry teach how designers using process control modalities run tens to thousands of simulations to analyze how the outputs of a circuit will behave according to the measured variability of the transistors for that standardization process. The measured criteria for transistors are recorded in model files given to designers for simulating their circuits before simulation. In this semiconductor example, if the variance causes the measured or simulated performance of a particular output metric (bandwidth, gain, rise time, etc.) to fall below or rise above the specification for the particular circuit or device it reduces the overall yield for that set of devices. One possible design approach is to stabilize the micro-powder onto a substrate to make the material more like a transistor. Weld the micro-powder onto a nickel nanowire of thin film to stabilize each particle’s mechanical contact environment. This enables each wire to be tested reliably against a specification. Then sets of wires typified by a common performance profile can be grouped and configured in a thermal circuit driven by precise computer control. In common service: Axil
Re: [Vo]:Stabilizing the E-Cat
This is somewhat along the lines of Celani's work, with particles on wire. - Jed
